Rekindling Old Memories
by kurosakidetsuya
Summary: One day, as Ran decides to spring-clean, she stumbles upon old photos of hers and Shinichi's. What are the memories that they bring back of when these two were younger? Read to find out! R&R Plz!
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer:- i do not own DC. If i did, Shinichi and Ran would be going out a long time ago :D**

**R&R please! i want to know how it is, as it is my first DC fanfic!**

It was a Sunday. Detective Mouri had gone to 'stake-out' an apparently suspicious bar, though Ran knew what he was going to do. Conan had gone with Dr. Agasa and the rest of the Junior Detective League for camping.

Ran had decided this was the best time to do a little spring-cleaning. All the troublesome parties were out of the house. Not that she would call Conan troublesome. He was the most mature seven-year-old she had ever seen, which in itself aroused doubts, but she usually warded it off.

She decided to start with the storage cupboards in the office. That was the one place that never got cleaned much. So after a quick breakfast, she headed down. She opened the cupboard, only to have a few of her father's files fall on her.

"Otou-san, how irresponsible can you get?" she muttered under her breath as she gathered the fallen files and put them in one pile on the floor. Bit by bit, she sorted out her dad's files and made three piles to accommodate all of them. Around mid-morning, she stumbled upon a packet. It looked bulky, and it was heavy. Ran wondered what it might be. Something to do with her dad's cases? Well, it was possible. But just to be sure, she decided to check it. Since it was heavy, the packet fell out of her hands just as she opened it, and hundreds of pictures flew out of it onto the floor.

"Oh, great," said Ran, cursing her luck, and bent down to pick them up. But as she looked at them closer, she realized it was pictures of her when she was small. And wait, Shinichi was there in most of them!

Her heart did a little leap. It always did whenever she thought of Shinichi, that mystery freak.

"Well," she thought. "I guess a little peak won't set me back too much."

And that's how she found herself looking at old pictures of her and Shinichi together.

They brought pack a lot of old memories. And a lot of pain. Remembering all the times she had with him made her miss him so much more.

As she sifted through the photos, she came across one of them in third grade. Shinichi was grinning his insanely stupid grin, with a bandage over his left eyebrow, while Ran, standing behind him with her arms around his neck, was also smiling, though it was evident that she had been crying.

"I remember this one," thought Ran. "It was when we had gone to Osaka for a day."

As though a projector had been switched on, the scene replayed itself in her mind…

_Yukiko, Shinichi's mother and Eri, Ran's mother had both made plans to take their kids along for a day-trip to Osaka. Once there, they'd shopped, gone to a video-game arcade for the kids, had lunch, and decided to shop again._

"_Geez," remarked Shinichi. "How much will you shop?"_

"_I don't know," said Ran. "But I kinda like it."_

"_Shopping is boring.."_

"_Is not!"_

"_..stressful.."_

"_Of course not!"_

"_..unproductive.."_

"_No!"_

"_..and did I mention boring?"_

"_Shut up, Shinichi!" Ran shouted angrily. "How would you know?"_

"_Because I've been dragged around by my mother almost every time she has to go."_

_The two third-graders were so engrossed in their argument that they didn't see where their mothers went, and ended up taking a wrong turn._

_When they realized it, they were pretty far from where they had started, and since this was their first time in Osaka, they didn't know where they were or where to go. And it was getting kinda dark._

_Ran, who was very sensitive to darkness and ghost stories even back then, grabbed Shinichi's arm and squeezed tightly. "I'm scared, Shinichi," she told him, her voice quavering slightly. _

_Unnoticed by Ran, Shinichi blushed hard when Ran held his hand. "Baka," he told her, trying to compose himself. "Nothing will happen. Don't worry."_

"_But I c-can't see okaa-san anywhere," she said. When he looked at her, she looked ready to cry. _

_He squeezed her hand back in reassurance. He was going to tell her not to worry, when they heard voices from the alley. Shinichi, being the curious young detective he was, went closer to listen._

"_P-please, stop," came a lady's voice._

"_You wish," snarled another voice._

_Ran came to Shinichi to tell him that they should get out of here, but accidentally tripped on a can. Shinichi caught her before she could fall and hurt herself, but the kicked can caused a loud ringing sound._

"_Who's there?"_

"_Uh-oh," muttered Shinichi. "Ran, stay behind me, okay?"_

_Ran was too scared to answer. Just then, the man pushed away a garbage can and found the two. _

"_You punks," he snarled. "Too bad you're gonna die so soon."_

_Though he too was scared, Shinichi didn't show it. Instead, he held Ran back protectively, and said, "Stay away!"_

"_Wish I could do that," said the man. "It'd save me a lot of trouble. But I don't know how much you heard."_

_Behind him, he heard Ran beginning to cry. "Sh-Shinichi, what d-do we do?"_

_The man seemed to be surprised by that name. "Shinichi? As in Yusaka Kudo's son?"_

"_What about it?" asked Shinichi defensively, though it scared him even more that this guy knew his dad._

_The man began moving towards them with his knife raised. "All the more reason why I can't let you go. You'd just go to the cops."_

Shit_, thought Shinichi. _I've gotten myself and Ran into one big jam_._

_Meanwhile, the mothers finally noticed that their kids weren't with them. _

_Eri began to panic. "Oh, no!" she cried. "What if they're lost? How will we find them? What if Ran gets hurt?"_

_Yukiko was much calmer. "Don't worry, we can ask the police to help. And anyway, Shin-chan's with her. He won't let anything happen to her. I guarantee it."_

_Back to the alleyway. Shinichi had remembered what his father always told him and tried to buy some time. Not that it worked. Come on, he was a freakin' third-grader messing with a hardened criminal. What do you expect?_

_He suddenly felt Ran's body go limp behind him. "Ran?" he whispered. When he got no reply, he looked back. _

"_Ran? Ran!" _

_The poor kid had fainted from the fright._

"_Never face away when you're in danger, boy!" cackled the man. Shinichi turned just in time to see him throwing the knife in Ran's direction._

"_No!" he shouted, and pushed Ran out of the way. She fell on the other end, unscathed, but as Shinichi dived away, the knife grazed his forehead. It began bleeding instantly._

_Now he was angry. No one tried to harm Ran and got away with it._

_With a yell, he kicked the nearest soda can, aiming right at the man's face. Caught off-guard, the man fell back on impact. Just as Shinichi was wondering what he was going to do next, he heard police sirens. _

"_Oh, crap!" _

_The man got up and ran into the darkness of the alley without a second glance at the kids._

"_Shin-chan? Ran-chan? Are you there?" came his mother's voice._

"_Okaa-san! We're here!" shouted Shinichi, then carefully hoisted the still-unconscious Ran onto his back. His forehead was really throbbing now, and he stumbled out of the alleys._

_The minute he got out, he was spotted by Eri. "Shinichi! Ran-chan!"_

_Hearing her, Yukiko also came running. As Eri picked up Ran from his back, Yukiko bent down to her son. "You're bleeding, Shin-chan!" she exclaimed. _

"_He..had a..knife," said Shinichi and collapsed into his mother's arms._

_When he woke up, they were in a taxi. The first thing he heard was Ran's exclamation. "He's up, he's up!"_

_Shinichi sat up. "Ran," he said slowly. The day's proceedings slowly came back to him. "Are-"_

_He never finished his sentence. Ran hugged him so tight that all the air was crushed right out of him. "I-I'm so glad you're okay!" she said, starting to cry again. _

_Shinichi went red. Very red._

_Sitting on the other side, Yukiko was silently giggling at her son's very red face._

"_B-baka," said Shinichi. "It was nothing."_

"Nothing, my foot," thought Ran aloud as she looked at the photo. "If I'm not wrong, he still has a slight scar from that day."

But then again, that mystery freak had always been like this.

**How was it? short? long? needs improvement? **

**Plz do R&R!**


	2. Chapter 2

As she put down that photo, her eyes caught one of them in ninth grade. It had been a play put up by their class, and Shinichi was prince while Ran was princess. In the photo, Shinichi was carrying Ran, bridal-style, and Ran's face was tomato-red. In fact, seeing the picture made Ran go red now also.

"I think I twisted my ankle in that," thought Ran, as the next trip to the past began…

"_Mouri-san! Kudo-kun! Are you ready?"_

"_Yes, sensei, we're coming!" Shinichi called out, and turned to Ran, who was still styling her hair. "Hurry up, will you?"_

"_Wait for a minute!" Ran retorted. "I have to look good on stage, right?"_

Che_, thought Shinichi. _You look good without any make-up on.

_Two minutes later, the whole cast had assembled near the entrance backstage. _

"_We're due on stage in two! Be ready!" said the stage manager._

_Ran looked around. She couldn't see Shinichi anywhere. At times like this, when she felt scared or nervous, it felt comforting to be with him._

_She went around, trying to find him. There he was!_

_Ran stopped short. _

_Shinichi was leaning on a pillar, with his script in his hand, doing a last-minute check, with a gentle breeze blowing through his hair. In the prince costume. Which suited him perfectly._

_Ran stood there, staring, a slight blush creeping up her face._

_Suddenly, Shinichi looked up. "Hey, Ran," he said, then looked at her. "Is something wrong?"_

_She shook her head slowly, redder than before. "No, it's..it's just, y-you look….g-good. I-in this c-costume, I mean."_

_Now it was Shinichi's turn to go red. "Well..I, uh….I.."_

_He tried to get a good reply, but his voice didn't exactly cooperate._

"_Y-you look…l-look good t-too."_

_Silence for a sec. Then Ran started giggling._

_Shinichi looked at her. "What?"_

"_No, nothing," said Ran in between giggles. "It's just, I was feeling a bit nervous before, but now, somehow, I feel much better."_

_Despite everything else, Shinichi smiled. Somehow, it always felt peaceful when Ran was happy._

"_Okay! Ballroom entries come up! And the prince and princess, you're next!"_

"_Oh, we're up!" said Shinichi, grabbing Ran's hand subconsciously. "Come on!"_

_The play went pretty smoothly. The ballroom dance scene was especially good._

Really_, thought Ran. _Having a ballroom partner like Shinichi is a blessing.

_It was true. Among everything else he did, he knew how to dance like a gentleman. While others were stepping on each others' toes during practices, Shinichi and Ran never had that problem. Even though Ran wasn't very sure of it, Shinichi could make sure it went smoothly. This was more than enough to instill Ran's confidence._

_They were all sitting backstage after the show, commenting on how good it went, and cracking up on a few mistakes. After some time, Ran got up. _

"_I'll go get some water," she said. "I'm thirsty."_

"_Shouldn't you remove those unbelievably long heels before you go?" asked Shinichi, eyeing her golden sandals. "You might fall in those things."_

"_Oh, don't worry," said Ran, smiling, as she walked to a vending machine. "I know how to handle them. I'll be perfectly-"_

_Just then she tripped on her heels. Her ankle bent in a painful manner, and she began to fall. She closed her eyes tightly and braced herself for the impact with the ground._

_A few seconds later, when nothing happened, she opened her eyes, just to see Shinichi standing there. With one hand he had held her left wrist while his other hand was currently around her waist, successfully breaking her fall._

"_Baka, what did I tell you?" he asked her in a teasing tone while he pulled her up and helped her sit down on the nearest chair._

_Ran turned a bit red as she remembered his hand around her waist, but fortunately for her, he didn't seem to notice._

_He sat down next to her to give her company. Quite some time passed. Finally, they heard excited noises from the corridor._

"_I guess the program's over," said Shinichi. "We better get going."_

_He got up, and just as Ran considered asking him to help her up, he said, "No ways. You're not getting up."  
>Ran blushed. "How did you know I wanted to get up?"<em>

_Shinichi smiled. "I'm a detective. And besides, I know you."_

_Ran blushed harder. "But-"_

"_No buts," he said, and in one swift movement, he had her in his arms, bridal-style._

_Now that took the cake. Ran's face looked redder than a tomato now. _

"_Sh-Shinichi! let me down!" _

"_No can do!" he smirked._

"_Leave me down! I think my leg's better!"_

_But nothing she said deterred him. He insisted on carrying her like that all the way to the parking lot, where their parents were waiting. _

_And he did it, too._

"I remember otou-san was very upset," thought Ran now. "He was very angry with Shinichi. Not that the mystery freak minded."

She giggled at the memory of his annoying expression whenever Mouri shouted at him.


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N : I'm soooo sorry i couldn't upload before this and it took so long! my school had started, and i had a writer's block, so it took some time! Again, sorry for the wait, and please R&R!**

**Disclaimer : I don't own Dc. If I did, all of this _so_ would have happened!**

As she picked up another bunch of photos, she came across a few photos of Shinichi and his football team practicing, her doing karate, and one where Shinichi was standing in his football uniform, holding a trophy, while Ran stood beside him in her karate dress, also holding a trophy. The rest of the fourth-grade football team stood in a semicircle behind them.

_How much do you like football? _Ran used to ask him when they were in fourth grade.

_As much as you like karate_, he'd reply with a smile.

The most prominent one in her hand was of them in seventh grade, standing with Megure-keibu, Takagi-kun, and Satou-san in front of the Tokyo Police Department. Both of them were in their middle-school uniforms, and while Ran looked worried, Shinichi was smiling sheepishly.

"If I'm not wrong," said Ran thoughtfully. "This was Shinichi's first case."

She remembered how skeptical she had been when he started investigating, and how worried she was near the end…

"_Don't get in the way, kid. This is not a sight for you," said Satou Miwako._

"_Who are you anyways?" asked Takagi Wataru, wondering how he could be so calm while seeing such a squeamish sight. _

The girl with him screamed, _he thought._ So what's with him?

"_Me? I'm Kudo Shinichi."_

_His announcement seemed to blow Megure-keibu away. He whipped his head around to stare at Shinichi._

"_Kudo? You mean Kudo Yusaka's son?"_

_Ran was surprised when she heard this. She knew Shinichi's dad was famous. There was hardly an individual who hadn't heard of Kudo Yusaka's best-selling character, the Night Baron. But so famous that even the police knew him? Especially the way keibu was saying it. It sounded like he knew Shinichi's dad personally._

_Shinichi gave him a triumphant smile. "Please let me help, keibu," he said._

"_Now look here," said the keibu. "Yusaka has been a great help many times in the past. It is out of respect to him that I am not throwing you out. You may have inherited his gift, but you're still a child."_

_Shinichi clearly looked offended at that. Ran stifled a laugh. He hated it when someone called him a child, or kept him out of a crime scene. He had been a mystery freak even back then._

_Ran, on the other hand, despised dead bodies. It had always made her feel sick, even though her father, now a private detective, was formerly a homicide detective with the Tokyo Police Force. _

_So she stood back a little as she watched the police doing their work, and Shinichi poking his head here and there and generally annoying the detectives._

"_Why don't you let them do their job?" Ran asked him when he'd been pushed out around the tenth time._

"_I want to help," said Shinichi._

"_It's not someone's test question, you know," she retorted. Shinichi was famous for helping out with tests in class. Even the most vigilant teacher had not been able to catch him in the act. _

_And he was by far the most intelligent kid in class. How he managed to sleep right through classes and still get a perfect score in his tests, she still didn't know._

"_Keibu! Look at this!" came Shinichi's voice, breaking into her thoughts._

_She looked. All three police officers were looking at the disheveled body, flabbergasted, while Shinichi looked pleased with himself._

He must have made a discovery_, thought Ran. _

_After that, people started listening to him, even if it was reluctant._

_Ran tuned out most of the deduction stuff. She wasn't particularly interested in murders, and she had heard enough of Shinichi's mystery rambling that day to last her at least till the next month. So she went and sat down in a bench. It was in a way lucky that the murder had been committed in the park._

_Around twenty minutes later, when Shinichi still hadn't come, she went back to the crime scene to see what was taking so long. Why couldn't that jerk just leave stuff like this to the police? _

_She reached there just as Shinichi disclosed the murderer._

"…_so only one person could have done it," Shinichi declared. "Isn't that right, Neyumi-san?"_

_The group gasped. "N-Neyumi? Neyumi killed Okara-san?" asked a man in his mid-thirties._

_Silence for a minute. Then, just as Megure-keibu reached for his handcuffs, the Neyumi girl made a run for it. _

"_Stop!" shouted Shinichi, and was the first one to run behind her. He turned out to be surprisingly faster, and caught up with her easily. But just as he reached her, she turned. Caught unawares, Shinichi didn't have time to react when she pulled him close to her and pointed a gun at his forehead._

"_Shinichi!" cried Ran._

"_Come any closer, and he gets a nice one right into his head!"_

"_Don't involve a kid into this, Neyumi-san!" called Satou-san._

"_This kid has ruined my plan and my life!" rasped the Neyumi girl. "I should ruin his too!"_

"_Sh-Shinichi!" cried Ran again, eyes brimming with tears._

"_Ran!" Shinichi called out. "Don't cry, Ran. I'll be fine."_

_She couldn't believe it. Even in his current situation, he was trying to console her._

_Neyumi jabbed the gun harder to his forehead. Shinichi groaned. _

"_You're in no position to be soothing anyone," she said coldly. "I suggest you bid your girlfriend goodbye!"_

_Very surprisingly, Shinichi smiled. "Oh, I wouldn't be too sure about that," he said._

_Neyumi was incredulous that he wasn't begging to leave him or crying for help. "What-"_

_That's about as far as she got. Shinichi swept his legs behind him, neatly tripping her. The minute she hit the ground and her gun flew out of her hand, Megure-keibu was on her. _

"_Ryunawa Neyumi, you are under arrest for the murder of Saijou Okara, and the attempted murder of a high school student."_

"_Case closed!" shouted Shinichi gleefully, totally forgetting the predicament he had just been in. _

_But Ran hadn't forgotten. In fact, she wasn't sure if she'd ever forget._

_She slowly walked up to him. When he noticed her, he smiled. "Hey, Ra-"_

_THWACK!_

_She gave him a very hard one on his head. _

"_Owwww!" groaned Shinichi. "What was that for?"_

"_Baka!" she shouted at him, and only then did he notice the steady stream of tears rolling from her eyes. "What were you thinking?"_

_Shinichi felt horrible. Way back in fourth grade he had vowed to himself never to let Ran cry. _

"_Ran…"_

"_Do you have a-any idea h-how worried I was?" she asked quietly._

_What happened next was a blur to her. One minute Shinichi was standing in front of her, with a guilty expression on his face, and the next, he was hugging her._

_Ran blushed. Hard._

"_I'm sorry, Ran," he whispered. "I'm really sorry for making you worry so much, and I promise I'll never do it again."_

"Promise my foot," said Ran as she smiled fondly at the photo. "He's still at it.

**A/N : i know Shinichi's first case was on the flight to Los Angeles, but hey, this isn't called fancfic for nothing.**

**So tell me how it is! Please R&R!  
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